Clone: A Biography
by okuaku
Summary: A biography of Rei, written by Asuka. All Criticism welcomed.
1. One

  
  
  
Prologue  
  
If someone had told me ten years ago that Rei and I would end up doing something like this... I would have laughed in their face. That's not a figure of speech; I _really_ would have laughed in their face.   
  
Me and Rei, write _her_ biography? _Together?_   
  
Well, here it is. Not much else for you to do but read it, now that you've bought it. Unless you haven't bought it yet, and are presently standing in the bookstore. If that's the case, you should probably give this book a chance. Ayanami still isn't the most communicative person, but, against all odds, she has managed to become _my_ friend. That fact alone is reason enough to read this book.   
  
I'll tell you right now that this isn't something we did for fun. It wasn't easy for either of us, and it might not be so easy for you, either. Rei Ayanami is more than an enigma, and even I don't pretend to understand her completely. Not after writing this book. Not with my extensive education in psychology. Even with all the progress she's made, she's still somewhat of a mystery to me, and she can still count all of her friends on one hand. She still isolates herself from others. She still can't communicate with other people. And so I'll be the one to present her story.  
  
I've taken the liberty of assuming certain things that she was vague about, but only for the sake of the reader. Her true intent has been left completely intact. In many instances, I've kept her original words, just as she spoke them. Hell, I was tempted to just transcribe the whole thing. But she asked me to do this, so I did it. I have described the events of this woman's life in my own words, to the best of my understanding. So here it is. The biography of the strangest girl ever 'born'.  
  
She is an enigma, and you can't understand her. But maybe, just maybe, you can accept her. I know I have.  
  
Now read the damn thing.   
  
Asuka Langley Sohryu  
  
  
  
  
  
  
_Shadows from the filtered sunlight_  
_ A strange feeling of never… white_  
_ Hidden shadows hear my secret_  
_ 'Each and every day is worthless.' _  
  
_ And every day was just the same,_  
_ Sighing, spoke, 'What a hopeless game.'_  
  
_ In this room the desperation_  
_ With a streak of mad elation_  
_ Beats with a still-silent madness_  
_ Just as my heart beats endlessly._  
  
_ So every day was just the same,_  
_ Sighing, spoke, 'What a hopeless game.'_   
  
  
Chapter One: Isolation  
  
  
_ "My first memory of life is my own death." _  
  
Those were the first words she spoke to me in one of our long recorded sessions that we had in preparation for this book. That one sentence explains Rei Ayanami better than anything I can think of. It just doesn't make sense… how can someone who's died still be alive to remember it? And as the very first memory? It's a sentence so unique that you'd only hear it from one person.   
  
Rei is unique in many ways. Her eyes have taken in so much, always open, but her mouth has been forever closed. Her entire life has been locked away, kept secret. No one knew her. She didn't even know herself.   
  
I should say that, prior to those private interviews, Rei had told me nothing about her past. It was a silent understanding between the two of us that the past was something we just wouldn't talk about. Hearing her story for the first time, hearing her pour out all of her secrets... It was more than horrifying. That's what this book is; a huge collection of terrible secrets given directly from the source.   
  
The first of these has to do with Rei's first memory. It's a memory from her first life. It's pretty horrible, and it's also something that I wasn't aware of before we started working on this book.   
  
She was murdered as a child. Her first memory is of Dr. Naoko Akagi's cruel face, the woman's hands gripping tightly around her throat. Her eyes, which I guess must have held some spark of innocence in them, rose to the ceiling, filled with tears. Full of pain, fear, all kinds of emotion. I just can't imagine it, looking at her now. Rei's always seemed like an unfeeling bitch to me, to be perfectly honest. I never really completely stopped thinking of her as an automated marionette. Even today, I still can't imagine her expressing that kind of emotion, even in death. Listening to these recorded sessions, there are a lot things I just can't imagine.   
  
I'm glad for it.  
  
_"You can be replaced…!"_  
  
When Rei woke up in her second body those words took on a very different meaning then the good doctor intended. Rei knows today that Naoko didn't meant 'replaced' literally, but to Rei, a little child, her words made complete sense. She was told 'You can be replaced,' and then it happened. No explanation needed. She was obviously the replacement. What child would be able to question that situation? I guess it would even seem ordinary after a while.   
  
Her own death, still fresh on her mind, lost it's importance. Death had taught her a couple of things about the way people really were, and it had taught her about the nature of the world, but it hadn't changed anything in the end. Death lost all significance.  
  
_"There was no space between my death and rebirth. After I was strangled, I awoke immediately in a new body. That experience, in retrospect, would seem like proof to me that death is nothing but emptiness."_  
  
How is it that she remembers her own death? Rei can clearly describe the event, but it didn't really happen to her. Curious, I spoke with Dr. Ritsuko Akagi about this.   
  
Dr. Akagi has more knowledge regarding Rei's condition than anyone alive today, and she insisted that it would be flat-out impossible. She maintains that Rei shouldn't have remembered anything about that first life.   
  
Rei disagrees.  
_  
"I knew, then, as a child, the exact reason. Floating in the light-colored orange liquid as two strangers examined me, two strangers who slowly became familiar. I knew the truth, then. My body was nothing but an empty shell, and my soul had been taken out of one and put in another. I had been replaced, and my soul had somehow carried my memories, or at least that one last memory. I'm sure of it."_  
  
They left her in the tank, which would then come to be used as the foundation for the dummy plug system. This tank was used to store her memories so that her new self, born without a soul, wouldn't be helpless in the real world. It was useful mainly because it allowed her to speak, think, and operate as a normal human being. They didn't expect her to be the same person.   
  
They left her there for a long time, and it's not really clear whether it was for several days or several weeks. There was no way for her to keep track of the time anyway, and I'm sure she didn't care. She was perfectly content to do absolutely nothing. So she sat there, sleeping whenever she wanted, submerged in the warm LCL. LCL is something that I've had a lot of experience with, but my experience is nothing compared to hers. She was raised on the stuff. She prefers breathing LCL to breathing air.   
  
Being surrounded constantly by the liquid was a great comfort to her, and it was an easy for her to temporarily forget the fact that she'd just been murdered. For that short period of time, all of her needs were taken care of. She had no desire to leave it. For Rei, that chamber was similar to a mother's womb.   
  
Actually, now that I think about it, a mother's womb is something that Rei never really experienced. Could that be part of why she isolates herself?   
  
_"It was very nice, I remember. I was always wanting to go back."_  
  
Eventually, she was removed from the transparent tank by two men; Gendou Ikari and Kouzou Fuyutsuki. Now, keep in mind that she had been in there for some time, surrounded by LCL in that artificial womb. Being removed from that place, her own strangulation still fresh on her mind, had to have been a traumatic experience. She wouldn't comment on this, but I'm sure that she must have been very frightened.   
  
She remained completely silent as they washed her and dressed her, not capable of speaking. Normally, this would have been done by a pair of nurses, but she clearly remembers that it was the two of them. After she was washed and dressed, Gendou tried to explain things to her, in his own unique way. I think Rei can explain it better.   
  
_ "Gendou spoke to me as he stood there, in that way he always stood when he was speaking to me. He never kneeled down for my sake. He didn't lower his face to my level. He always seemed so much higher. I didn't think him an evil person, at the time, for doing this. In my young eyes he was simply too tall and too immense to stoop down. Too tall to lower himself to my level, too immense to treat me as if I had worth.   
  
"'Do you understand what has happened to you, Rei?' he asked me. I couldn't respond, of course. I wasn't capable of speech at that point. I felt sure that the horrible woman would return and strangle me.   
  
"'Rei, what is the last thing you remember?' he asked me, and my hands went to my throat without thinking. I started sobbing. Head down, I walked towards the tank, shuffling my feet. My hands were still covering my neck.   
  
"He caught me in his arms before I could get far. He tried to comfort me, making soothing noises. I sometimes doubt my own memory at this point. Thinking of it now, it seems ridiculous.  
  
"I buried my head in his chest, shaking uncontrollably, my hands still covering my neck. He held me, saying nothing. I will not describe this further. I cannot explain Gendou Ikari. I don't understand him, and I never will."_  
  
He took Rei back to his office, maybe leading her, maybe carrying her. He set her down in his chair, and she sat there mutely, staring down at his desk. He starting talking to her, trying to comfort her, I guess.   
  
He spoke to her as if she were an adult, as if she could actually comprehend the reality of what had happened to her. What an idiot.  
  
"Do you understand what has happened to you?" he asked. "You have died. We have put you in a spare body. There will be no problems."  
  
He was trying to reassure her obviously, but how would that be reassuring? There was no emotion or empathy in his voice. Personally, I don't think he was even capable of empathy.  
  
"Can you speak, Rei?" he asked.  
  
"Yes," she said quietly, staring down at his desk.  
  
"The last thing you remember is being choked?" he asked, insistently.   
  
He had to know if that last memory had somehow carried over. Even at a time like that, the project was his first and only concern. Even as she sat there, traumatized, changed... He felt the need to interrogate. I don't think he ever really cared about her, no matter what she says.  
  
"Yes," she said, her voice barely audible and empty of emotion.  
  
A pause.   
  
"Are you hungry?"  
  
"Yes."  
  
_ "I was starting to cope at this point, I think, and this may have been when I truly started to turn inwards on myself. But I don't think so. I don't think it was the shock of being removed from that place of safety that drove me to hide inside myself.   
  
"I think it was that one last cruel statement, spoken in anger to a defenseless child. A seed of hate that somehow grew into a great fear and contempt of all people._  
  
From that day onwards, Rei would be able to trust no one. I can't blame her. Apparently, she couldn't even trust herself.   
  
I'll let her explain.   
  
_ "Even my own actions would occasionally be suspect. I retained parts of my previous self that were unfamiliar. A sick and manic grin sometimes threatened to spread across my face, though I never let it out._  
_  
"I would observe critically every act of every person, though I said nothing. I trusted no one. When had I been given reason to trust? None of the children in school would speak to me. It was as if I was surrounded by an invisible wall that kept other people away. I never really experienced life as a teenager, or even as a child. My premature death had forced me to maturity, forced me to become an adult. _  
  
Not many can relate to this. It doesn't fall neatly into any category. It isn't Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. It isn't Asperger Syndrome or High Functioning Autism. It certainly isn't Rett's Disorder, or Childhood Disintegrative Disorder. The evaluations almost always came out the same. Pervasive Developmental Disorder- Not Otherwise Specified. PDD-NOD. In other words, a mental disorder that can't be easily defined.   
  
But even that isn't the truth, not by far. She didn't have a 'disorder' that caused her to act the way she did. No, it was a decision that she made. It was a method of protection that she chose herself.  
  
_"I am not human, not animal, not angel. My species has never been clearly defined. I am simply 'Rei'. Made to be one of a kind, and then copied for the sake of convenience.   
_  
Gendou took it upon himself to teach Rei everything that she needed to know. She would have to take care of herself for the most part, so he taught her the basics. He taught her how to keep herself clean. He told her that she would have to change her underwear every day. He taught her about nutrition, and exercise. In that apartment, where she would eventually be left alone, he gave her a crash course on life.   
  
He could only teach her what _he _himself knew, of course. He couldn't teach her about making friends, but he _could_ teach her about influencing people. He could teach her about cooking, but he couldn't teach her about the joy of it. In his defense, he could teach her about both pride _and_ prejudice, but I still can't imagine a worse teacher.  
  
_"Rei, this is a toothbrush." _  
  
She knew what a goddamned toothbrush was. She wasn't a completely new person, but he treated her as if she was.  
  
_"It is important to brush your teeth every day. Move the bristles from side to side. Scrub the front, the back, and the gums."_  
  
What does Rei think about all this?  
  
_"It was necessary. There were certain things I had to know. I don't see the problem." _Whatever.  
  
He stayed with her at first, in a small apartment. Rei was careful to mention that this was _not _the same apartment in which he had lived with Yui.   
  
"_I wondered why he didn't stay in the same place he had lived with his wife. Shinji Ikari answered this question for me when he asked his father if he had kept any pictures her. No, he had obliterated all physical evidence. Thrown everything away. Except me."  
_  
Most of her time was spent at Nerv, a place that was both familiar and terrifying to her. It would be a long time before she would become comfortable with that place again. Ironically, I feel something similar these days, thinking back on my final days at Nerv...   
  
Sorry Rei, didn't mean to bring myself up again. You know it's my favorite subject. Back to the story.  
  
She would follow him around the Nerv premises like a shadow, a blank stare constantly on her face. If she wasn't with him for one reason or another, she would be in the care of one of the responsible adults. They would try to be kind to her at first, of course. At first, they would treat her as a normal child, thinking that she was just a little shy.   
  
Much like Naoko Akagi, they would soon change their opinion of her. She was too quiet. She was too strange. She was too mature for her age. She would stare at them, and it was as if their authority as adults vanished completely. They couldn't intimidate her, so they felt vaguely threatened by her.  
  
_"There was something inside me that looked to them for some kind of guidance. Standing there, my eyes locked with theirs in a cold stare, I wanted them to realize the true depths of my unhappiness. I didn't realize how frightening this would be to them. So, in reaching out for help, I only isolated myself."_  
  
On one of those first days, a woman approached Rei, smiling kindly. Rei didn't acknowledge her right away, and she probably seemed like a very shy and quiet girl at first glance. The Commander and Fuyutsuki were probably standing somewhere nearby, doing something important.  
  
Rei met her eyes without really meeting her eyes, looking straight through her.   
  
"Rei-chan, why don't you smile for me?" the woman asked.  
  
It sounds easy enough. Anyone can smile, right?   
  
But Rei didn't respond. The woman asked her to display an emotion, so she displayed a complete lack of emotion.   
  
Makes her sound like a hypocrite, doesn't it? She complains about this deep sadness, but doesn't make any attempt to be happy. Shouldn't she have at least tried to smile? Isn't it hypocritical to say _'I looked to them for guidance'_, and then completely ignore the guidance that they give?   
  
No, that's not hypocrisy. Hypocrisy is asking a little girl to smile without giving her a reason to be happy.  
  
The woman, confused, left Rei alone, and didn't speak to her again. She was the first of the many adults that Rei would drive away. There wasn't a single person at Nerv, besides Commander Ikari of course, that could ever hope for any kind of connection with the girl. They were willing to be kind to her, yes. Under certain conditions.   
  
Every relationship has two sides, like the two sides of a coin. The existence of any relationship is dependent on both sides; both people. In a land of nickels, quarters and pennies, Rei was foreign money.   
  
Hell, she hadn't even been minted yet.  
  
She didn't have the exploring eyes that most children have, or that endless energy that irritates so many parents. This gave people the impression that she was overly mature, so that's how she was treated, with almost the same respect that was given to the Commander. I know she said that it was her early death that made her overly mature for her age, but I think she's wrong. She isn't exactly a casual observer in this. So, I'm going to make a conjecture.  
  
I don't think it was that single tragic incident that turned her into a girl that would say something like, 'Mankind fears the darkness, so he scrapes at it's edges with fire,' at the age of fourteen. It may have turned her into an isolated and suicidal loner, but it certainly didn't make her grow as a person.   
  
That ageless wisdom she has is something that has always been there, cultivated by years of solitary thinking. Not exposed to the outside world as often as most people, her mind was like a blank slate. In that room, everything was hers to interpret, with no one around to feed her the garbage that every other child gets. Completely isolated, her strangeness gestated.  
  
I've always wondered what sort of things she did when she was alone. Did she talk loudly when there was no one to hear her? Did she occasionally get a burst of energy and start hopping up and down? It would make sense if she did. Emotion that is repressed often comes out in other ways. But she didn't. She was always the same.   
  
In fact, the idea that she might have acted differently in private was a little puzzling to her.  
  
_"I don't understand."  
  
"Don't you have a secret side of yourself that you don't show to anyone?" _That's me.  
  
_"I was willing to show to others anything that I was willing to show to myself."_  
  
Gee, thanks for another cryptic statement, Rei. Anyway, I should move on.   
  
After the first couple of weeks, Gendou moved out completely. I guess he must have lived in the Nerv barracks from then on, assuming that he had to sleep sometime. Her life became very structured, in a way.   
  
_"I established a set pattern for my life, one that I became used to. I resisted change, but I desired death. This did not seem like a contradiction to me. No, death would be an eternal status quo. Eternal emptiness. This was my only desire."   
_  
She's scary sometimes, really.   
  
School.  
  
Now, Rei was just the sort of person who should have gone to Kindergarten, so of course she didn't go. She didn't even know about it until the first grade, which she attended at the age of six.   
  
Other children were scared of her, sometimes.  
  
_ "One morning, I was standing by myself in front of the school, waiting for the first day to begin. A child, seeing me for the first time, became frightened. She ran to her mother crying, 'Is she a monster?'_  
  
_ "What hope did I have of understanding others when their immediate reaction was always fear, or contempt? They would distance themselves from me before I even had a chance to distance myself from them."   
_  
I can't help but feel a little bit ashamed as I'm writing this, listening to Rei's monotone whispered words as they play. If I had been one of those children in her class, I would have taunted her. I would have hurt her, ignored her, and then gone on my merry way, convinced of my own superiority. I would have placed her beneath me.  
  
But this book isn't about me, it's about Rei, so I'll go back to where I left off.  
  
Rei was not often given guidance or emotional support from the teachers, but they taught her the things that all students have to learn in first grade. She wasn't an exceptional student, but she did what she was told. She learned simple mathematics, science, Japanese, and so on.   
  
She also started learning how to play the viola, something that appealed to her for some reason.  
  
_"I liked to play music, sometimes._"  
  
She doesn't often say that she 'likes' anything, so that caught my interest.  
  
_"What do you mean?"  
  
"I mean what I said. __I also liked to swim, and sleep. And I liked fresh air. I liked speaking with the Commander, when he was in that sort of mood."  
  
_Well, how about that.   
_  
_She doesn't have many other early memories of the first grade. A good portion of her time was spent at Nerv, and she was absent often. When she did go to school, she wasn't ever willing to talk with the other children. They usually weren't all that eager to talk to her either, so she passed most of her days in school quietly and undisturbed. She does remember that her teacher once requested a conference with her parents, which leads us to the next scene.  
  
The three of them sat in Rei's first grade classroom; Gendou Ikari, the Commander of Nerv, Rei's young first grade teacher, and Rei herself. The teacher, sitting across from Gendou, was pretty intimidated.   
  
"Mr. Ayanami..." the teacher began.  
  
"Ikari," he corrected, interrupting her.  
  
"Oh, yes, I'm so sorry. I should have remembered that," she said, laughing nervously.  
  
"What is the problem with Rei?" he asked coldly.  
  
"Rei seems to have trouble dealing with the other children," the teacher explained, her tone easy and sympathetic, "She seems very unfocused in class."   
  
He responded immediately, speaking quickly, "What do you want?"   
  
Put off by his directness, the teacher drew back for a moment before replying, "Well... she just seems very distant. As if she's off in another place. I'm afraid she may be having problems at home."  
  
"Is that all?"   
  
"Uh, well... yes, I guess it is," she said, not sure how else to respond.   
  
"Very well. I will handle it."   
  
And with that, Gendou began his long history of neglect. He and Rei left the classroom. He didn't say a word. He didn't do anything at all to solve the 'problems at home' that he knew existed.   
  
Why did he do it? Maybe he needed Rei to stay the way she was. Maybe he needed to be sure she wouldn't rebel against him. If she developed a personality, if she learned to talk to other people, she might rebel against him. As it was, he was the only person that gave her life meaning. Maybe he wanted to keep it that way. Personally, I think that's exactly how it was. Why else would he raise her the way he did?   
  
Rei has a different opinion.  
  
_"Leaving me to fend for myself was, in his mind, the only possibility. This was the way he dealt with people."  
  
"Couldn't he have left you with a responsible adult? Someone that he trusted?"  
  
"No. He didn't trust anyone." _  
  
Not much of an excuse, is it? Well, I'll let her have her opinion.   



	2. Two

_ I have left my voice long lonesome_  
_ Never spoken and never known_  
_ All empty words are loathsome_  
_ Why is it they express nothing?_  
_  
_ _The desire for sound is strong_  
_ Sitting here in sane still silence_  
_ But, no, that still is slightly wrong_  
_ And so I have expressed nothing_  
  
_ No, I want to sing some sad song_  
_ That might make my voice manifest_  
_ But no one here can listen long_  
_ And so I will express nothing_  
  
__  
_ The uncaring eye has betrayed me, it seems, deceiving the observer_  
_ That sad idealist beneath the breast, it deems, a timid undeserver_  
_ In the past this object has, unseen, ignored my everyday desires_  
_ A tiny female child, unclean, receiving lies from pious liars_  
  
_ Ever condescending, yet not exactly a separate entity_  
_ Deep and silent, waiting, and always sharing of my identity_  
_ Though sleeping, it still seeks an ending, and any ending will do_  
_ And somehow, my sensible sense rending, all of the lies become true_  
  
_ With all that I have written here, though I know it's just a truthful lie_  
_ It still fills me with doubt and fear, in truth it is **mine**, this lying eye _  
  
  
  
Chapter Two: A World of Whispers  
  
  
One day, Rei asked the one person that she trusted a simple question, and got an answer that was far too simple and far too truthful.  
  
"Why am I here?" she asked, knowing that he would understand her meaning.  
  
"Your purpose is to destroy mankind as we know it," was the nightmarish reply.  
  
And so, Gendou rears his ugly head once more. What the hell was he thinking when he told her, a little girl, something like that? Was he hoping that she would just eventually get used to the idea? Did he think she would be excited by it or something? Did he think she wouldn't care that she was a real live monster?  
_  
"He was always honest with me. He kept only a few precious secrets. Would it have changed anything if he hadn't told me? Yes, but it would have only made things worse. You fail to understand the situation. He wanted me to know these things. He wanted me to know that I had a purpose; a reason to be alive. He wanted me to lose my desire to return to emptiness. Eventually, I did."  
_  
This was a little confusing to me, since Gendou's entire _plan_ was based around the fact that she would be willing to sacrifice her own identity. I asked her for further explanation. _"Didn't he **want** you to be suicidal, so that you wouldn't disobey him? So that you'd go along with his plan?"_  
  
_"Don't use the word 'suicidal'. It isn't appropriate for this. I will explain why, later. In any case, Gendou Ikari was a self conflicted man. I cannot always explain his actions."  
_  
Remember that, by this time, Rei was living alone. Gendou was a man obsessed, and Rei would never be his first priority. Still, she came to his defense, ignoring my logic.  
  
_"He had his reasons. The situation was complex, and cannot be described by someone that was in my position. I do not hold any of these insignificant things against him. The only thing that I hold against him is that he sought to eliminate my free will. You probably think that I am making excuses for him. I have no reason to do that."  
_  
Well, I can't really argue with her (since she doesn't really have an argument), so I'll just let it rest for now. She'll always think of him that way; hating him for treating her like a possession, yet loving him at the same time. God knows why.  
  
In the beginning, I thought that she was using him, like a teacher's pet. I thought she used him to further her own goals, so that she could get special treatment.  
  
Christ, I was an idiot back then. I had no idea how complex the situation actually was. Oversimplification just made things so much easier for me.  
  
The main thing that I've been searching for, listening to these recordings, is a simple comparison. What is it that separates Rei as a child from Rei as a teenager, or Rei as an adult? Is there any real difference between them? If there wasn't, it would scare the crap out of me, because that would negate everything that I've learned about Rei. It would make her a monster, in my mind. Thankfully, that isn't the case. The Rei that I hear being described in these interviews is far different from the Rei that I know today.  
  
For one thing, she actually cared what people thought about her. Too immature to have gained a cynical self-confidence, she was frightened by any sort of social intercourse, and she avoided other people at all costs. Much of what she knew about herself came from these other children, speaking about her amongst themselves. Occasionally, one of the meaner children would speak directly to her, and that was much harder to ignore.  
  
"You're weird. Can't you talk?" Or some insult like that.  
  
"Yes, I can talk." Or some passive and meaningless reply like that.  
  
She was seemingly impervious to these barbs, since her expression was always uncaring, but she inwardly accepted them as being the truth. It made perfect sense for her to do so. She _was_ weird, after all. She _was_ a freak. She _was_ the least talkative child in the school.  
  
And there was more; there were things about her that the children in her school would never know. The things they saw in her as strange were just a fraction of the reality. Even the fanciful stories they made up about her, portraying her as a demon and worse, didn't match up to the truth.  
  
Back then, this is the Second grade, Rei had a much different perspective on things. I think her words can explain it better than mine.   
  
_ "The other children... they would speak, but never said anything of any significance. They could only state the obvious. At that young age, however, I was not aware of this. I thought that they were, in a way, superior to me. I would be treated as an inferior because of my social ineptness, and I came to the natural conclusion that the scale that they were using to judge me was the correct one. I came to the conclusion that I was a bad person. I wanted to somehow conform to their standards, but was unable. I was unable to understand them at all. That world of whispers didn't belong to me, and I didn't understand it."_  
  
I interrupted. _"'World of whispers'? What do you mean?"_  
  
Rei gave me a cold glare. She hates being interrupted when she's actually _talking_. _"They always whispered about me, and I could hear them."_  
  
She continued. _"Trying to understand them was a useless endeavor, and I came to realize this with time. I also came to realize that I did not need to please others. There was no reason to."_  
  
She has very few friends, even today. I used to think that that was all she needed; friends. I thought that, if she learned to communicate somehow, she would find that she wasn't really all that different from anyone else. Everyone has problems, you know? I thought she was obsessed with her own self inflicted pain and depression. She was obviously just way too self-absorbed, right? That was really stupid of me, I have to admit. It should have been clear to me. Though Rei's problems were very similar to my own, I never guessed the truth, and it never occurred to me that she might lack a sense of self worth, just like me.   
  
She has four friends, but I'm tempted to say she only has three, because Touji and Kensuke are only worth about half a point each. I'm forced to bring them in, but I would have preferred to just leave them out entirely. Unfortunately, they are an important part of this, and they were among the only students from Rei's early classes that I could track down.  
  
Touji Suzuhara and Kensuke Aida first met Rei in the first grade. Actually, 'met' isn't really the right word. They first saw her in the first grade. They would continue to see her throughout their childhood. They wouldn't really meet her until much later. As for me, I don't think I really met Rei until recently, when the two of us sat down at my dining room table with a tape recorder running.  
  
Kensuke and Touji knew Rei better than any of the other students, and even talked to her a few times, but, for whatever reason, she wasn't exactly overflowing with fond memories of the two.  
  
_ "I don't have anything to say about them from those days. I wasn't aware of them. Just students in my class, like the rest."_  
  
I found that a little hard to believe. Touji and Kensuke weren't exactly two non-descript kids that kept to themselves. "No_ memories at all?"_  
  
_"They were students in my class."_  
  
They, on the other hand, had plenty to say.  
  
_"Well, to be honest, I thought she was really weird, from the first day I saw her. Like, sometimes the teacher would ask her a question, and she'd just stare at him."_ That's Touji.  
  
_"Yeah, I remember that. Personally, I think she knew the answer, but she just wouldn't say it."_ That's Kensuke.  
  
_ "Why would she want to do something like that?"  
  
"Passive aggressive behavior, I guess."  
  
"What the hell do you mean by that?"_  
  
And so on.  
  
I don't think I'll transcribe anything else from _that_ particular tape. I'm sure you understand.  
  
Rei didn't fit in very well at school, for obvious reasons. Her odd paleness and her strangely colored hair and eyes were always very noticeable, especially on the first day of the school year. It took a lot of silence and a lot of motionless sitting to allow her to fade into the background, but, pretty soon, people learned to ignore her as easily as she ignored them.  
  
She never excelled in school, though she did pretty well in some subjects. She was good with math, always turning in assignments completed and on time, and usually doing well on tests. She didn't do particularly well in Japanese, for obvious reasons, and she was horrible with English, though her grades weren't that bad. History was her best subject. She was also good at sports; a quick runner, a fast swimmer. This is a little strange, since a person with an introverted personality generally tends to shy away from sports. A girl like her probably should have been either scrawny or flabby, but she was always in good shape. Having always been a little curious about this, I asked her directly.  
  
_"I enjoyed it,"_ she said. still a master of the short answer.  
  
Though a little frustrated with her, as was usual, I pushed for more. _"I always thought that you **had** to stay fit, that it was something that you were ordered to do... did you really enjoy it?"_  
  
_ "It **was** something that I was ordered to do. This doesn't mean that I couldn't enjoy it. It was something simple. Understand?" _  
  
No, I didn't understand. Rei tends to say things in a way that doesn't make sense to anyone besides herself, these days.   
  
_"Please explain a little more,"_ I implored her.   
  
A brief pause.  
  
_"I cared for nothing, least of all myself. I believed as a fact that I had no true worth as an individual. This was the attitude I displayed. People would say I was repressed, but, in actuality, I repressed very little. 'Repression' does not describe it. 'Apathy' does not describe it. None of these convenient words you're using can describe it."  
  
"I don't really understand what you mean," _I said,_ "What does that have to do with running and swimming?"  
  
"Absolutely nothing. Understand?"_  
  
She's got a weird way of communicating sometimes, but I guess it's better than saying nothing at all, like she used to. She's always thinking and observing, but her face is always passive. She's always wearing that expression that says, 'I don't care,' but she's always paying attention. You get the feeling that you could have a conversation in front of her and she wouldn't listen to a single word, but this isn't the case. No, she listens to everything, she just doesn't think and react the same way that the average person does. The average person will care what other people think about them. She, on the other hand, doesn't. She doesn't display emotions and facial expressions for the benefit of others.  
  
Her flow of logic is a little strange sometimes, and she often misunderstands a person's intent completely. This wasn't much of a problem when she was a child. All she had to do was complete assignments in class and follow simple orders from Gendou Ikari. She didn't often have to deal with other people on the sort of personal level that would allow a painful misunderstanding.  
  
On the rare occasion that one of the other children would speak with her, however, and make a futile attempt at being friendly, Rei would misunderstand their intentions completely.  
  
One morning, during the break, Rei sat alone at a bench, as she usually did. My guess is that she was practicing Kanji or something like that. In any case, on that morning, a new transfer student from her fourth grade class approached her, probably pitying her, and perhaps intrigued by her strange looks.  
  
"Uh, hi. I'm Takako. Mitsuhara Takako. Are you here all by yourself?" she asked, curious and sort of concerned in a childish way.  
  
"Yes," Rei responded, her typical one word non-answer.  
  
The girl, new to the class, was surprised by Rei's dead tone.  
  
"You sound sick. Are you okay?" she asked, wide-eyed and innocent.  
  
Rei, thinking that the girl was trying to insult her, just repeated herself. "Yes."  
  
"Uh... okay. Bye."  
  
The girl left, and would never try speaking to the strange girl again.   
  
That same day, and this is not a coincidence, two boys tried to approach her, and failed. Their names were Kensuke Aida and Touji Suzuhara. According to Touji and Kensuke, she was pretty much the same back then as she was when I first met her. They were always in the same class, every year, and she never seemed to change her attitude, or even her facial expression. After a couple years of this, they started to get a little bit worried. Those two may be idiots, but, when it comes to people, they're a lot more observant than you'd think. They knew that Rei wasn't just some emotionally repressed girl, even at that young age. They, like myself, figured that a friend or two was all she needed.  
  
Having seen the rare encounter take place, the two of them decided that some kind of action should be taken. A young Kensuke Aida stood next to a young Touji Suzuhara on the basketball court of their school. As Touji dribbled a basketball absentmindedly, the two of them discussed their naive plan.  
  
"But how are we supposed to do it?" asked Touji, still very hesitant.  
  
"We'll just go talk to her. How else do you make friends with someone?"  
  
"Talk to her? She's like... weird."  
  
"Yeah, that's the whole reason we're doing this," Kensuke reminded him, "Remember?"  
  
"But what are we gonna say? 'Hey, what's up'?"  
  
"Well, why not?" Kensuke shrugged. "She's just a girl."  
  
"It just seems... weird. What if she actually says something back?"  
  
Kensuke rolled his eyes. "Are you scared of her? You know the stuff they say about her isn't really true, right?"  
  
And so the two of them agreed to their plan, and chose a specific time and place. If Rei had been male rather than female, this would have been much easier for them, and they probably wouldn't have felt it necessary to actually plan out something as simple as a friendly greeting. They discussed many possibilities; calling her, going to her home, talking to her during lunch, and even sending her a note. It sounds unbelievable, I know, but those two were always doing weird stuff. One time they snuck out of a shelter during an Angel attack, and were nearly killed.  
  
Ultimately, they decided to pretend that they just happened to live in the same apartment building as hers, (assuming that she lived in an apartment building and not some kind of dark, scary cave), and would therefore have a valid reason to be walking in the same direction as her. They planned this out pretty thoroughly for a couple of grade school kids, thinking up excuses to give if she questioned them as to why she hadn't seen them at the building, or why she hadn't ever seen them on her way home. I wouldn't be surprised if Kensuke actually drew out possible routes of travel on a map. He was only about nine years old at the time, but he's always loved that kind of thing. He's a geek personified.  
  
That afternoon, after school ended, they carefully put their plan into effect.  
  
The two of them exchanged glances, remaining seated as the rest of the class left, and standing only after the girl in question had left the room. Nervously, they followed her, keeping a distance at first. There was no reason for this, realistically, though they said it was a part of their plan. They were just scared of her, like everyone was, and keeping a distance was the natural thing to do. It would take some courage for them to actually go up and talk to her.  
  
They tailed her as she walked at a brisk pace, staring straight forward, and tried not to be noticed. She turned into an alleyway, an empty alleyway, leaving their field of vision. They followed her, peeking around the corner of the building. She was exiting on the other side of the alley. They hurried to catch up. They were heading towards an empty section of the city. It started to rain. Then, something happened that would change their perception of Rei forever.   
  
This was when the two boys really started to feel uneasy. There wasn't anything spectacularly strange about what Rei was doing, but I can imagine how it must've felt for them. They must've felt as if they were trying to prey on a predator; stalking this girl who was starting to seem almost inhuman. Everything in her projected an attitude of uncaring; her gait, her expression, her clothes, her hair... everything. The rain, dripping down her cheeks like an overused metaphor, completed the atmosphere. Whereas a normal girl would have ran to shelter, used an umbrella, or at least started walking faster, Rei had no reaction to it at all. The sight of a small girl walking emotionlessly through the rain is just utterly creepy.  
  
They continued to follow her for several minutes, remaining unnoticed as far as they could tell, until Rei came to a stop in front of a bench on the sidewalk. The boys watched in confusion as she sat down, rain still pouring down on her. She remained there for some time, not doing anything in particular.  
  
_"I sunburn easily, and so I usually had to hurry home. On the Commander's orders, of course. Still, I would sometimes want to delay my arrival to my apartment, which wasn't cleaned often. I did that sometimes, especially if there were enough clouds to block the sun. People would bother me occasionally, if there were people around. They would assume that I was a lost child if I was sitting by myself, so I usually went to an empty portion of the city. But it isn't important. It was just something I did."_  
  
Touji and Kensuke could do nothing except stand there stupidly. If they went up and talked to her, they would have no way to explain what they were doing there. It would be obvious that they had followed her, and they would have no excuse to give her. Rei wouldn't care, of course, but they couldn't have known that.  
  
So they stood there, and every strange rumor that they had heard about the girl started to surface in their minds. She was a demon, maybe, or a witch. She had murdered both of her parents, and lived alone. She could kill with a single emotionless glance. These theories gained more credibility with each second that passed. Kensuke and Touji left, quickly, and would never look at Rei the same way again.  
  
Rei doesn't even remember this incident. Sitting alone in the rain wasn't a strange thing for her to do, really. She was just wasting time. But to Touji and Kensuke, that one act, which they would never be able to understand, proved beyond a doubt that Rei was something other than human. Like I said, they're idiots. I can't help but wonder what might have happened if she had gone straight home that day, rather than pausing to sit in the rain. Would the three of them have somehow become friends?  
  
Well, probably not, but it's possible. If they had actually been willing to give her a chance, and not just assume all kinds of stupid things about her, she might have been able to make a few friends. "World of whispers' is how she describes it, and that says it perfectly. They loved to talk about her, but they hated talking to her, and that's how it's been for her entire life, up until this very day.  
  
There's been at least one change, though. I don't assume _anything_ about Rei anymore.   
  
  
  
_A note from Rei Ayanami - The way she has described it to this point is not completely correct. It wasn't that people misunderstood me, and allowed me to push them away against my own desires. It wasn't that I was afraid of them, and how they would judge me. That was part of it, but not everything. It was also that I wasn't the same as them. It is almost like she was describing earlier in the story with the various coins. I was different. Something hidden lay dormant inside me. I cannot be compared to others.  
  
Rei Ayanami  
  
  
A note from the Author - I think you can see why **I'm** the one that's writing this. I just read through the poems she wrote for this chapter and the note she added in to criticize me, and... well, I'm sure she's gonna cut this bit out, so I might as well just say that SHE IS AN INSANE FREAK.  
__  
Asuka Langley Sohryu_  
  
  
End Chapter Two  
  
  
  
  
Thanks goes to LeperMessiah and nodsri for pre reading.  
Thanks goes to Rev'd for the idea of writing this from Asuka's viewpoint.   
  



	3. Three

_There once was a girl from Venus   
Of an uninspired genus  
She did not care for prose  
But if ever need arose  
She would make it monotonous  
  
Though asking 'why' in a careless tone  
To her, the answer's already known  
Seeing no reason to give her trust  
She turns her back in sad disgust  
With a faint, barely audible moan  
  
-  
  
There once was a girl from Mars  
With her eyes all full of stars  
She took quite well to prose  
Neither vague nor verbose  
And she didn't mind her scars  
  
Though asking 'why' in an angry tone  
To her, the answer cannot be known  
Seeing no reason to place mistrust  
She embraces it all with heady lust   
And hopes that her example is shown  
  
-  
  
Well, the Martian girl does not know why  
The Venusian lets life pass her by  
She wants to lend a little help  
To this sad, mysterious, lonely whelp  
So she points toward the wide. star-filled sky  
  
The sky is the source of the stars in her eyes  
Lit brightly with the yearning of countless sighs  
Wherever you are, it is near   
A sanctuary from reasoned fear   
An answer to all those apathetic 'whys'  
  
-  
  
A naïve argument of perfect disagreement,  
Is a contrived, callous, cruel, self-imposed treatment   
Hardly rousing any realistic thought,   
And achieving nothing that should be sought  
A well considered ignorance in agreement_  
  
  
  
Chapter 3: Yet Another Ending   
  
  
Eventually, I just asked her bluntly. _"So, are you gonna explain what you said about suicide, or what?"_  
  
Rei wasn't suicidal. She didn't want to kill herself, in other words. She wanted everything to end in fulfillment of a destiny, yes, but she never held a razor to her wrist. She never contemplated hanging herself. She knew what death would mean, and wasn't particularly eager to go through it again.   
  
_ "For most people, suicide would be an end. For me, there could be no end. I could always be replaced... but I have said all of this from the beginning. To answer your question more directly, there was a part of me that was actually driven to fulfill my purpose."_  
  
In other words, there was a part of her that wanted Third Impact, and not just death. And also...  
  
_ "I could never kill myself, because that is something that only human beings do."_  
  
She describes herself as though she's impossible to understand, like she's some kind of soulless monster or something.  
  
_ "I am not a human being."_  
  
But that's bullshit. She has emotions and feelings, just like everyone else. If she'd told me that she was a monster back when I didn't know her so well, I might have believed her. But, just reading through what I've written so far, it's obvious that Rei is at least a _little_ normal. You _can_ compare her to others, and I don't care if she writes in a fucking note this time or not.   
  
The problem is that there was nothing to distract her from these depressing thoughts about death and hopelessness. There was no one to give her a much-needed slap in the face when she was at her lowest points. She had very little human interaction in her life, and would only later come to understand that she didn't want nothingness. She would never, however, get rid of this idea that she wasn't human.   
  
_ "I am partly a demon. This is a fact. I am not a human being."_  
  
But it's her _emotions_ that make her human. I mean, maybe it was true, in the very beginning, that she wasn't human. Maybe it's _still_ true, but it just doesn't matter anymore. I think that she'll eventually learn, just like me, that it's best to just forget the past sometimes. Sure, anything that doesn't kill you makes you stronger, but anything that _does_ kill you won't help at all. She's died a few times, so she's obviously doing something wrong.  
  
Anyway, let's move on to a seemingly unrelated subject.   
  
_"I first knew myself to be attractive from the other children. Gendou Ikari never told me, though he knew that I would have listened. He was reluctant to speak about that sort of thing, I believe, because of my resemblance to his wife. In any case, he didn't prepare me for what would happen when my breasts began to grow larger."_  
  
I was able to smile, finally. Even Rei could raise light topics of conversation, occasionally. "The boys were interested in you, then?"  
  
_ "They were interested in my body, yes. It meant nothing to me. One of the few things I deigned to sneer at in my youth was male sexuality."_  
  
_ "So you turned them down, without even **thinking** about it? Come on."_ I gave her a knowing look, a false smirk on my face. I think I was getting desperate.  
  
She paused and thought about it. When she spoke, slowly, thoughtfully - there was a sort of bitterness in her voice that I'd never heard.   
  
_"I considered it, yes. I considered sacrificing of every existing quality I possessed for something of no worth to me. I considered letting them use me, knowing that the only thing that interested them was underneath my clothes. I considered letting them through my field of security for no other reason except that they had an urge that meant nothing to me. I still considered it... But after that brief consideration there was no desire left. No desire for any human relationship in my life, beyond what already existed. I let them take this desire from me."_   
  
Self-disgust is very rare for her. I've never known her to have that look on her face, like she felt dirty, and the bitterness in her voice betrayed that she was hiding something. Something personal. I was tempted to feign ignorance, but the temptation to know the truth was stronger.   
  
_ "Rei, are you sure that's all there is to it? There's nothing more?"_  
  
She stared through me, a hint of anger in her eyes. She knew that I was accusing her of lying. The fact that she was lying didn't help matters. [i]"It is not my intention to speak of anything insignificant, and you are not the one to judge what is important in this matter."[/i] She knows how to argue a non-existent point, I'll give her that.  
  
_ "Rei, if it isn't important, why did you bring it up? Come on. If I'm interested, everyone else will be too. That's the whole point of this, remember?"  
  
"Very well. I will follow your advice."  
  
"Thank you."  
_  
Seeing how hesitant she was to begin, my heartbeat quickened. It was obviously going to be something interesting.   
  
Rei, in the third grade, didn't have to deal with other children any longer. They just left her alone, as they had learned to do. She spent the time in class just staring out the window, and could sit by herself during the breaks without being bothered. As time passed and she grew more and more apathetic, she would come to appreciate this. Back then, she didn't. She still hoped for a friend.  
  
'Then why didn't she ever talk?' the reader might ask. 'Well', I might reply, 'Have you been reading so far, or did you just skim?'  
  
_"There was a very quiet transfer student in my class, who also happened to live in the apartment next door. I often saw him standing outside his apartment, staring at the sky. I believe he was a year older than myself. When Shinji arrived, several years later, I was vaguely reminded of this boy."  
_  
She immediately sensed that there was something different. There was something that separated him from the other children. Rei knew that she wasn't ever likely to have many friends, but, at that point, she still believed in the possibility of a kindred spirit. She was still seeking some kind of friendship.   
  
This boy, this new transfer student, never seemed to speak. He always seemed to radiate sadness, and had a silent, uncaring nature. In the classroom, he tended to stare out the window, and always answered the teacher's questions in a whisper. He never talked to anyone during the breaks, always staying by himself. He stared at Rei sometimes, something that she interpreted as curiosity. She was curious about him, so it seemed natural that he would be curious about her as well.  
  
She continually watched him, waiting for something that would prove him to be normal like the others. Perhaps he would laugh, or hum, or do something else that would betray some sort of inner contentment. This expected sign didn't came, and she grew ever more hopeful that she might have found something like a 'friend'.  
  
_ "Gendou was kind to me, but I desired something more. I wanted to believe that there was someone who could understand my words. Someone less mature than the Commander, but more peculiar than any child."_   
  
_"He was very tall, and many of the students were afraid of him. His silent nature frightened them, and I thought nothing of the rumors I overheard. Some of the children spoke about him amongst themselves, saying that he was violent and crazy. They told stories about him, just like me."   
_  
He was strange looking compared to the other students, since he was so tall, she would reason, and he never spoke or displayed even a bit of emotion. He spoke in a whisper, just as she did. They told stories about him, just like they told stories about her. The only thing that seemed at all incongruous was his tendency to stare [i]at[/i] people, and not through them.  
  
In the classroom, she watched him out of the corner of her eye, not wanting him to notice her. If he turned in her direction, she would pretend to be looking at something else. I don't mean to give the impression that she had some sort of shy crush, because it was hardly that. Rei wanted a friend and nothing more, but she had learned to be cautious.   
  
_"I was very hesitant to approach another person, to tell someone things about myself. I didn't want him to know that I was watching him. I had learned that people were like predators, searching for weaknesses to exploit. Keeping silent, and keeping things secret... it was a way of avoiding them. It was many days before the desire to speak with him overcame my fear of intolerance."_  
  
She was patient for the appropriate moment, waiting until after school when she could be sure there would be no interruptions. When she approached him, it was without pretense. It was the only time she would ever really reach out to a person.  
  
_"I just started talking. I told him about myself, my desire to become nothing. I told him that death was an eternal nothingness, and that nothingness was my greatest desire. I told him that my purpose was nothing less than absolute death, as I thought. I told him that no one understood, and could never hope to. I told him that I was very sad. I kept on speaking and speaking, as if I knew that it was my only chance, and that I would never speak that way again."_  
  
He listened, this large and quiet boy, as sincere emotion blossomed across her usually blank face. He probably didn't really understand much of what she was saying, but he didn't interrupt her. She kept on speaking, as if reading aloud from an impossibly long monologue, revealing parts of herself she desperately needed to show.   
  
She finished, and saw him smile for the first time. At this point, perhaps his emotion has revealed itself, in reaction to Rei's own expressive outpour? He becomes her one friend, someone she can confide in and so on? No, his smile wasn't a pleasant one.  
  
_"I am glad that this happened at such a young age. If we had been teenagers, it might very well have been much worse. As it was, he only grabbed and frightened me, and pressed his lips against me in a disgusting way. I think he clumsily grabbed one of my breasts, but I'm not sure.   
  
"I thought he was like me. I thought that his silent nature was an expression of his emptiness. This boy was the worst of the type bred from sex comics and television. His silent nature hid nothing but his perversity. In a way, he turned out to be stranger than I was, but that was hardly a comfort."  
_  
She had come to see the innate difference between herself and other children. A quiet boy like him may have had similar mannerisms, but that was where the similarity ended.   
  
She ran away from him. Rei retreated into her apartment and locked the door with a shaky hand. Leaning against the door, breathing heavily, her face emptied of the emotion she had gone to so much trouble to express. She didn't care anymore, and she wouldn't be so quick to trust a stranger in the future.  
  
_"I had made many assumptions, and all of them were wrong. Still, I took this experience the wrong way; I will admit that. It wasn't proof that I had no hope of ever making a friend. It was just proof that I was a young fool.  
  
"It was foolish of me to think that this boy would be similar to me just because he was socially inept. Gendou never taught me one of life's most ill learned lessons. 'Never trust anyone'. Trust and faith are very much overrated."  
_  
With that nice sentiment, I'm going to move away from Rei's perspective on this and give my own, just for a moment.  
  
In the aftermath of my first bad experiences as a teenager, it's always been my opinion that too much importance is placed on romantic relationships. Romantic relationships are important from a psychological viewpoint, but people will often obsess over them, and that's self-defeating. Shinji Ikari is a prime example of this. He told me once that he used to fantasize that a woman would 'complete' him as a person. I think his exact phrasing was 'become one'. I used to think something similar when I was younger. I had a crush on an older man, named Ryouji Kaji, and I thought he would change everything for me.  
  
'Becoming one' is an impossible thing. Rei realized long before Shinji and myself that this notion, this idea of 'becoming one', is just a comforting delusion; a selfish hope. Shinji might call it a 'prayer'. That fits it pretty good, I think. Everyone prays that there's someone out there that compliments them like that. Someone that fits them so well that they could become like one person.  
  
Rei stopped saying that prayer a long time ago. I, for one, don't plan on telling her to start saying it again. I might try to get her laid, though. Male sexuality may be the one thing that she 'deigns to sneer at', but if anyone could use a bit of loosening up, it's her. She completely avoided the lonely road of the hopeless romantic, but ended up on the solitary cynic stretch. Just because there isn't a person that fits her completely, just because there isn't a person that can 'become one' with her, she's decided that it's hopeless, and given up.   
  
What sort of attitude is that? How do you justify choosing loneliness over loneliness? I've heard her say 'I am formed by my interactions with others', meaning it with complete sincerity. She values other people; she doesn't 'deign to sneer' at them like she pretends to. I may be taking that out of context, but it still holds true today. It's how she acts.   
  
That experience with the perverted boy, something that she was hesitant to speak of even in the privacy of my apartment, shows why it was necessary for Rei to become so good at lying to herself. She's convinced herself that it's just not worth it to seek human relationships. She's convinced herself, in so many words, that there is no one that compliments her even slightly.  
  
_ "I am not unhappy, as I used to be, and I don't desire an end to everything. My life is a solitary one, but that is out of necessity. Both romance and sex are meaningless to me, so there is no reason to seek companionship. My friends are few, because there are few who care. To put it plainly, I do not enjoy solitude, but it is the best of my options. The Angel in me wants to remain isolated, because Angels are solitary creatures. The human in me longs to meld and fuse with other humans, becoming one and, in doing so, gaining a complete understanding of one another."  
_  
She thinks that assuming there's someone for everyone is hopelessly romantic. That's not true. It's hopelessly romantic to say that there _isn't_ someone for everyone. No one is so special that they have to be alone forever, even though they don't want to. Not even Rei. Yeah, the Angel in her wants to be isolated, while the human in her wants to become one with others, but both sides are _wrong_, so it doesn't matter. In the end, there's really nothing stopping her.  
  
Human relationships aren't something to be dismissed as impossible, no matter what the circumstances. She's isolated, strange, and different, but that doesn't matter. It's stupid for her to think that she has to be exactly like everyone else to be liked. I've met everyone else, you see, and I don't really like them at all.   
  
This is your biography, and, hopefully, everyone who reads it will be able to understand you better. I'm hoping that, after you've read it, Rei, _you'll_ understand better too.  
  
  
End Chapter Three  
  
  
_A note from the Author - Rei, please grow up. If you're going to cut stuff out, fine, but don't write stupid, sarcastic limericks just to get back at me. That last stanza was obviously a response to the stuff I wrote at the end. I was just giving my opinion like you said I should.   
  
A note from Rei Ayanami - Those poems are written seriously, and there is no need to take offense. If you look closely, you'll find that I agree with your statements. You do not think that I would accuse you of being naïve?   
  
  
  
_Pre read by LeperMessiah. Sexed by Rev'd.   
All reviews and criticism welcomed.  
_okuaku@hotmail.com_  
^ ^/^ ^.^ _ ?s  



End file.
